Author Guidelines

Please ensure that you consider the following guidelines when preparing your manuscript. Failure to do so may delay the processing of your submission. A downloadable version of the style guide is available by clicking here.

Article types

Research articles (maximum 8,000 words) Research articles constitute the main content of the journal. They must describe the outcomes and application of unpublished original research. These should make a substantial contribution to knowledge and understanding in the subject matter and should be supported by relevant figures and tabulated data. Research articles should be no more than 8,000 words in length.

Commentaries (maximum 3,000 words) Commentaries should reflect upon or critique a specific "happening" such as a release of a major study or other notable occurrence related to journal focus. Authors interested in submitting a commentary piece should discuss the content with the editor before submitting a manuscript. Commentary articles should be no longer than 3,000 words in length.

Reviews (maximum 3,000 words) Reviews can cover topics such as current controversies and emerging areas within the broad field of sustainability , as well as issues of regional or temporal focus. Papers should critically engage with the relevant body of extant literature. Review articles should be no longer than 3,000 words in length.

Book Reviews (maximum 1,500 words) Book reviews should review recently published books covering controversies and emerging areas within the broad field of sustainability, and highlight the important areas covered by the publication. Authors interested in submitting a book review should discuss the content with the editor before submitting a manuscript. Books reviews should be no longer than 1,500 words.

Editorial (maximum 2,000 words) Editorials should reflect on the papers in the current issue and/or some specific aspect of the subject that is important at the time of publication. Alternatively an editorial may be submitted as a video (maximum of 5 minutes).

All word limits include in-text citations, but not the reference list.

Open Access

This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. Authors of articles published remain the copyright holders and grant third parties the right to use, reproduce, and share the article according to the Creative Commons Attribution license agreement. Unless otherwise stated all third-party content is copyright of its original owners and where this applies, attribution must be clearly given in the manuscript.

Structure

Title page

The title page must include all of the below information, in the same order. No further information should be included:

Author names must include a forename and a family name. Forenames should preferably not include only initials. The affiliation should ideally include Department/School, Institution, City and Country, however only the Institution and Country are mandatory. The title page should be submitted separately from the main text to support the double-blind review process.

Abstract

Research articles must have the main text prefaced by an abstract of no more than 250 words summarising the main arguments and conclusions of the article. This must have the heading ‘Abstract’ and be easily identified from the start of the main text. A list of up to six key words may be placed below the abstract (optional).The Abstract and Keywords should also be added to the metadata when making the initial online submission.

Main text

The body of the submission should be structured in a logical and easy to follow manner. A clear introduction section should be given that allows non-specialists in the subject an understanding of the publication and a background of the issue(s) involved. Methods, results, discussion and conclusion sections may then follow to clearly detail the information and research being presented.

Up to three level headings may be present and must be clearly identifiable using different font sizes, bold or italics. We require the use of Headings 1, 2 and 3 in MS-Word’s ‘Style’ section.

Please do not change the default margins on MS Word.

Acknowledgements (optional)

Any acknowledgements must be headed and in a separate paragraph, placed after the main text but before the reference list. Acknowledgements would normally include your University Research Project Supervisor if they are not included as a co-Author. This section might also include thanks to individuals or organisations who assisted at various stages of the research process, along with participants in the study. If research objects (for example research data, software, methodologies) have been deposited in an open repository please provide a statement on access and include a persistent identifier.

Competing interests

If any of the authors have any competing interests then these must be declared. A short paragraph should be placed before the references.Competing interests might be financial or non-financial relationships. Examples of competing interests include:

receipt of payment, in any form, from an organisation or individual related to the research subject matter

receipt of gifts from an organisation or individual related to the research subject matter

ownership of stocks or shares in organisations directly related to the research subject matter

receipt of grants or funding

membership of boards of organisations involved in the research project

commercial interests in the products or services offered by an organisation or individual related to the research subject matter

Please place the competing interests section at the end of the manuscript, immediately before the reference list. The authors’ initials should be used to denote differing competing interests. Examples of statements are as follows:“SV has received payment for work from [company X] as part of this research project. There are no other competing interests."“SK has registered shares in [company Y], which provided funding for this project. There are no other competing interests." “EW is a member of the editorial board for [journal Z]. There are no other competing interests."If there are no competing interests, please add the following statement: “The author declares that they have no competing interests” or “The authors declare that they have no competing interests”.

Ethics and consent (if applicable)

Research involving human subjects, human material, or human data, must have been performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, and any codes of conduct developed by relevant professional, regulatory or funding bodies, as well as institutional expectations and standards. Where applicable, the studies must have been approved by an appropriate ethics committee and the authors should include a statement within the article text detailing the name of the ethics committee and reference number of the approval. Research participants should be fully informed about the research aims and possible risks, and should give informed consent to participate in the study, ideally in writing, voluntarily, freely and without any coercion. Where human participants cannot give an informed consent themselves, it should be obtained from their legal guardian(s). The identity of the research subjects should be anonymised whenever possible. Further information on protection of research participants is available here. Experiments involving animals must comply with applicable national legislation, relevant codes of conduct, and ethical and welfare standards. Where necessary, relevant licences and/or permissions should be obtained.

References

All references cited within the submission must be listed at the end of the main text file. Please refer to the ‘References’ section at the end of this document for in-text citation and reference list instructions.

Slip-Sliding on a Yellow Brick Road: Stabilization Efforts in Afghanistan

Headings within the main text:First level headings in the text should follow the same rule as the main title.For lower-level subheadings, only capitalise first letter and proper nouns.Headings should be under 75 characters.

Spelling Submissions must be made in English. Authors are welcome to use British or American spellings as long as they are used consistently throughout the whole of the submission.

Colour (UK) vs. Color (US)

When referring to proper nouns and normal institutional titles, the official, original spelling must be used.

World Health Organization, not World Health Organisation

Grammar English or American grammar rules may be used as long as they are used consistently and match the spelling format (see above). For instance, you may use a serial comma or not.

red, white, and blue OR red, white and blue

FontArial font size 12 should be used for the main content of your submission. This may be changed during the typesetting process.Underlined text should be avoided whenever possible.Bold or italicised text to emphasise a point are permitted, although should be restricted to minimal occurrences to maximise their efficiency.

ListsUse bullet points to denote a list without hierarchy or order of value. If the list indicates a specific sequence then a numbered list must be used.Lists should be used sparingly to maximise their impact.

Quotation marksUse single quotation marks except for quotes within another speech, in which case double quotation marks are used.Quotations that are longer than three lines in length must be in an indented paragraph separate from the main text.The standard, non-italicised font must be used for all quotes.It must be clear from the text and/or citation where the quote is sourced. If quoting from material that is under copyright then permission will need to be obtained from the copyright holder.

Acronyms & AbbreviationsWith abbreviations, the crucial goal is to ensure that the reader – particularly one who may not be fully familiar with the topic or context being addressed – is able to follow along. Spell out almost all acronyms on first use, indicating the acronym in parentheses immediately thereafter. Use the acronym for all subsequent references.

Research completed by the World Health Organization (WHO) shows …

A number of abbreviations are so common that they do not require the full text on the first instance. Examples of these can be found here.Abbreviations should usually be in capital letters without full stops.

USA, not U.S.A

Common examples from Latin origin do not follow this rule and should be lower case and can include full stops.

e.g., i.e., etc.

Use of footnotes/endnotesUse endnotes rather than footnotes (we refer to these as ‘Notes’ in the online publication). These will appear at the end of the main text, before ‘References’.All notes should be used only where crucial clarifying information needs to be conveyed.Avoid using notes for purposes of referencing, with in-text citations used instead. If in-text citations cannot be used, a source can be cited as part of a note.Please insert the endnote marker after the end punctuation.

Data & Symbols

SymbolsSymbols are permitted within the main text and datasets as long as they are commonly in use or have explanatory definition on their first usage.

Hyphenation, em and en dashesThere is no set rule on the use of hyphenation between words, as long as they are consistently used.Em dashes should be used sparingly. If they are present, they should denote emphasis, change of thought or interruption to the main sentence and can replace comas, parentheses, colons or semicolons.

The president’s niece—daughter of his younger brother—caused a media scandal when…

En dashes can be used to replace ‘to’ when indicating a range. No space should surround the dash.

10-25 years

pp. 10-65

Numbers For numbers zero to nine please spell the whole words. Please use figures for numbers 10 or higher.We are happy for authors to use either words or figures to represent large whole figures (i.e. one million or 1,000,000) as long as the usage is consistent throughout the text.If the sentence includes a series of numbers then figures must be used in each instance.

Artefacts were found at depths of 5, 9, and 29 cm.

If the number appears as part of a dataset, in conjunction with a symbol or as part of a table then the figure must be used.

This study confirmed that 5% of…

If a sentence starts with a number it must be spelt, or the sentence should be re-written so that it no longer starts with the number.

Fifteen examples were found to exist…

The result showed that 15 examples existed…

Do not use a comma for a decimal place.

2.43 NOT 2,43

Numbers that are less than zero must have ‘0’ precede the decimal point.

FormulaFormulae must be proofed carefully by the author. Editors will not edit formulae. If special software has been used to create formulae, the way it is laid out is the way they will appear in the publication.

Figures & Tables

FiguresFigures, including graphs and diagrams, must be professionally and clearly presented. If a figure is not easy to understand or does not appear to be of a suitable quality, the editor may ask to re-render or omit it.All figures must be cited within the main text, in consecutive order using Arabic numerals (e.g. Figure 1, Figure 2, etc.).Each figure must have an accompanying descriptive main title. This should clearly and concisely summarise the content and/or use of the figure image. A short additional figure legend is optional to offer a further description.

Figures, titles and legends should be placed within the text document, either after the paragraph of their first citation, or as a list after the references.The source of the image should be included, along with any relevant copyright information and a statement of authorisation (if needed).

NOTE: All figures must be placed within the main body of the text, if possible in colour and at a resolution of at least 300dpi.

Tables Tables must be created using a word processor's table function, not tabbed text.Tables should be included in the manuscript. The final layout will place the tables as close to their first citation as possible.All tables must be cited within the main text, numbered with Arabic numerals in consecutive order (e.g. Table 1, Table 2, etc.).Each table must have an accompanying descriptive title. This should clearly and concisely summarise the content and/or use of the table. A short additional table legend is optional to offer a further description of the table. The table title and legend should be placed underneath the table.Tables should not include:

Rotated text

Colour to denote meaning (it will not display the same on all devices)

Images

Vertical or diagonal lines

Multiple parts (e.g. ‘Table 1a’ and ‘Table 1b’). These should either be merged into one table, or separated into ‘Table 1’ and ‘Table 2’.

NOTE: If there are more columns than can fit on a single page, then the table will be placed horizontally on the page. If it still can't fit horizontally on a page, the table will be broken into two.

References

In-text citations

Every use of information from other sources must be cited in the text so that it is clear that external material has been used.If the author is already mentioned in the main text then the year should follow the name within parenthesis.

Both Jones (2013) and Brown (2010) showed that …

If the author name is not mentioned in the main text then the surname and year should be inserted, in parenthesis, after the relevant text. Multiple citations should be separated by semi-colon and follow alphabetical order.

The statistics clearly show this to be untrue (Brown 2010; Jones 2013).

If three or fewer authors are cited from the same citation then all should be listed. If four or more authors are part of the citation then ‘et al.’ should follow the first author name.

(Jones, Smith & Brown 2008)

(Jones et al. 2008)

If citations are used from the same author and the same year, then a lowercase letter, starting from ‘a’, should be placed after the year.

(Jones 2013a; Jones 2013b)

If specific pages are being cited then the page number should follow the year, after a colon.

(Brown 2004: 65; Jones 2013: 143)

For publications authored and published by organisations, use the short form of the organisation’s name or its acronym in lieu of the full name.

Please do not include URLs in parenthetical citations, but rather cite the author or page title and include all details, including the URL, in the reference list.

Reference listAll citations must be listed at the end of the text file, in alphabetical order of authors’ surnames.All reading materials should be included in ‘References’ – works which have not been cited within the main text, but which the author wishes to share with the reader, must be cited as additional information in endnotes explaining the relevance of the work. This will ensure that all works within the reference list are cited within the text.NOTE: If multiple works by the same author are being listed, please re-type the author’s name out for each entry, rather than using a long dash.NOTE: DOIs should be included for all reference entries, where possible.

Reference formatThis journal uses the Harvard system – see below for examples of how to format:

Books:

Author, A A Year Title. Place of publication: Publisher.Adam, D J (1984) Stakeholder analysis. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Silverman, D F and Propp, K K (eds.) (1990) The active interview. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.Achebe, C (1995) Colonialist Criticism. In: Ashcroft, B et al The Post Colonial Studies Reader. London: Routledge. pp. 57–61.NOTE: If multiple works by the same author are being listed, please re-type the author’s name out for each entry, rather than using a long dash.

Author, A Year Title. Newspaper, date of publication, [URL and last accessed date].Patel, S S (2005) Climate; In a Marsh, Sifting the Past And Seeing the Future. The New York Times, 6 November [online access at http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9800EEDF173EF935A35752C1A9639C8B63 last accessed 28 April 2014].

Conference papers:

Author, A Year Title of chapter. In: Title of conference proceedings, location, date, pp. page.Lynch, M (2003) Dialogue in an age of terror. In: The Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Philadelphia, PA on 18 August 2003, pp. 4-7.

Author, A Year Title. Unpublished thesis (PhD), institution.Yudis, A (2004) Failed responsibility of the media in the war on Iraq. Unpublished thesis (PhD), University of Manchester.

Webpages / PDFs:

Author, A Year Title, date of publication. Available at URL [Last accessed date month year].Pascual, Amb. C (2005) Stabilization and Reconstruction: Building peace in a hostile environment. Prepared statement to Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, 16 June 2005. Available at http://2001-2009.state.gov/s/crs/rls/rm/48644.htm [Last accessed 14 August 2012].

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in Comments to the Editor).

Any third-party-owned materials used have been identified with appropriate credit lines, and permission obtained from the copyright holder for all formats of the journal.

The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines, which is found in About the Journal.

Tables are all cited in the main text and are included within the text document.

Figures are all cited and embedded in the main text. Figures/images have a resolution of at least 150dpi (300dpi or above preferred). The files are in one of the following formats: JPG, TIFF, GIF, PNG, EPS (to maximise quality, the original source file is preferred).

Acknowledgements have been included, providing grant or contribution numbers where appropriate as outlined in the Author Guidelines. Where applicable details of access to research objects have been included.

Where required manuscript includes a competing interest statement in accordance with our Competing Interest Guidelines.

All DOIs for the references have been provided, when available.

Every effort has been made to ensure that author names are removed from the manuscript (following the instructions to ensure blind peer review).

The submission file is in Microsoft Word document format.

If the submission was originally a piece of assessed work at University, the permission of your supervisor to submit has been given – see authorship guidelines.

Only 3 headings have been used and they have been set using the MS Word functions in the 'Style' section.

Where applicable the ethics number has been detailed in the main body of the text.

Copyright Notice

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.

Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.

Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).

Privacy Statement

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.

Publication Fees

Section

APC

Research

None

Editorial

None

Review

None

Commentaries

None

Book Review

None

The journal does not require student authors to pay to publish their work in this journal.